Are you a Facebook user?

[David Eastwood]

I originally signed up to keep an eye on what my kids were up to.

When it became apparent that they were behaving themselves, I became a bit more active; I now help to administer a small, closed, photography group, and am semi-active in a few brand-specific guitar groups. It's also a very convenient way to keep in touch with my family in England.

I've always been more of a lurker than a poster, going back to newsgroup days, and Facebook is no exception - and I try, really hard, to follow this advice:

[AX17609]

A fun way to find out how the internet thinks about you is to study the ads that appear in your Facebook feed. These have been specifically directed to you as a result of your browsing history. Currently, the internet thinks I'm the sort of person who would like to decorate my front entryway with dragon statues.

[catdaddy]

I set up an account several years ago in hopes of locating some friends and family members I'd lost touch with over the years. Happily, Facebook facilitated that successfully for me. Since then I use other means to keep in touch with those folks, and I haven't been active on Facebook for a couple of years now.

[Sagebrush Tom]

I've had a Facebook page for about 2 years. Rarely use it anymore, just don't like the overall content. If they ever decide to remove politics & religion i'm back.
Tom

[fitness1]

Originally Posted by Sagebrush Tom

I've had a Facebook page for about 2 years. Rarely use it anymore, just don't like the overall content. If they ever decide to remove politics & religion i'm back.
Tom

You can simply unfollow the "friends" that post that kind of thing regularly. I've done that with my own relatives

[Sagebrush Tom]

Originally Posted by fitness1

You can simply unfollow the "friends" that post that kind of thing regularly. I've done that with my own relatives

Agreed, but that doesn't fix their major problems.
Tom

[Wadcutter]

If you enjoy people posting selfies and what they had for breakfast that day, and every other day, well, FB is a great place to hang. IMHO, a gigantic time thief and waste of band width.

[perttime]

I don't remember why I originally joined. For the last couple of years, there's been a couple of main uses for me: 1) collecting old family photos and memories in a family Group. That is nice. 2) Keeping updated in a couple of hobby/sport related Groups, which could be nice but isn't because the hobbies/sports frequently suffer from new legislative proposals.

Oh, and I follow a few luthiers who often post nice guitars.

[Gmountain]

No. Never. I don't need Facebook scraping and selling my information.

If I wanted to keep up with friends from high school or nursery school, I would have. Anyone I want to stay in touch with, I am in touch with.

Facebook friends are not real friends. Real friends are the people you call in the middle of the night to help you get rid of a body.

My idiot brother in law likes to tell me he has 500 friends. What a moron. He doesn't even know these people.

I don't care what people are eating, or where they are walking, or what their cat looks like. I don't care if their baby's vomit looks like a map of North America.

I don't want to see some stupid meme. I don't want fake news.

No thanks, Facebook does not do it for me.

[Sagebrush Tom]

Originally Posted by Gmountain

Facebook friends are not real friends. Real friends are the people you call in the middle of the night to help you get rid of a body.

Real friends also dig the hole first. Better than having to dig more than one hole.

Tom

[perttime]

Forgot my real question.

Why do people take the trouble to post things like:

"I'm not on Facebook, never will be. "
(and that is all the content)

... in a guitar related thread where some information is on Facebook? Why is it important to tell everybody that the poster hates Facebook? Why not just move along?

[Pitar]

FB to me is a banner under which people gather for a purpose I do not feel compelled to acknowledge any logical legitimacy in. I see it as the epitome of the herd instinct to do as others do in an oblivious trend to trust complete strangers with sensitive personal information. IOW, FB stands as the hallmark of the world's population displaying its lapsing intellect in numbers no one should be proud to be counted in.

[Pura Vida]

Originally Posted by perttime

Some people clearly have a need to point out that they are not Facebook users, given the slightest opportunity.

So, how do you really feel about Facebook?

FB is a convenient way to keep in touch with friends and family all over the world, as well as in my own neighborhood. But it can be a toxic place and a huge time suck, so it's all about making sure you're using it in a way that's comfortable with you.

As for your initial question, some people take pride in showing their resistance to anything new, different, or what may take them out of their comfort zone.

[Guitars+gems]

There's a trend here, "I'm on FB but I don't post." Is that like not inhaling?
I enjoy Facebook. I keep up with people I don't live near and wouldn't see if not for FB. I love seeing pix of their happy life events, and I'm grateful to be given a chance to offer my support during difficult times. I post pix of my family or of the beautiful scenery where I live. I share the occasional uplifting or interesting post. My town has a couple of informative pages that are relevant to the issues and news of our community. I follow a page of Eckhart Tolle quotes, a Byron Katie page, a science website, my jewelry making suppliers page, etc.

Sure, there are a few who overshare; I keep scrolling. I defriend or unfollow anyone who posts too much ego driven opinionation; I cut quite a few "friends" in the months leading up to the 2016 election, when the vitriolic fake news memes were rampant.

As for the information, like others here, I never thought my browsing history or my demographics were secret. The FB ads that are targeted to me are pretty spot on, lots of guitars, beads, gemstones. I prefer those to ads of stuff I'm not interested in. Right now on the bottom of this page there's a strip of photos from a clothing website. I don't know the company, but some of the dresses look very similar to a dress I looked at on a different website this morning.

[Gmountain]

Originally Posted by Guitars+gems

T I don't know the company, but some of the dresses look very similar to a dress I looked at on a different website this morning.

Don't you think that's kind of scary?

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